Trial of 19 Bahabanis Held “in 20 Minutes”; Prosecutor Claims It Was to Review “Legal Requirements”
According to reports, the court session for 19 detainees from last year’s protests in Bahaban lasted only 20 minutes. Although Iranian judicial authorities initially denied this, after confirmation by defense lawyers, the general and revolutionary prosecutor of Bahaban County eventually accepted holding such a trial today and described it as reviewing “legal requirements.”
On the evening of July 17, 2020, a group of Bahaban residents held a protest rally in support of three people detained in the November 2019 protests who had been sentenced to execution. The rally was eventually suppressed by military forces and followed by widespread arrests of protesters.
On Saturday, December 25, 2021, a court session to examine charges against several citizens arrested in those protests was held in Branch 103 of Criminal Court 2 of Bahaban County in Khuzestan Province, presided over by Judge Rasoul Rasoulinezhad.
Arash Sadeghian, a political activist, described the 20-minute court session for the Bahaban protesters in a tweet thread, noting that Judge Rasoul Rasoulinezhad questioned only a few defendants during the 20-minute court session (examining charges against 19 defendants). There was no representative from the prosecutor’s office present at this trial, and the judge read the indictment in place of the prosecutor’s representative. Except for Farzaneh Ansarifer, Maryam and Ali Kazemi, whose lawyer was Ms. Tabanian, other defendants were deprived of having a lawyer.
